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Editorial: Obama has several options on immigration

Carlsbad Current-Argus

Posted:
08/23/2014 01:00:00 AM MDT

President Obama is expected to announce in coming days a series of executive actions on immigration reform. It appears increasingly likely that he will deal with more than simply suspending deportations for certain classes.

The Associated Press reported this week that Obama is considering executive actions on changes in the nation's immigration system that have been requested by business leaders. One potential step that's popular among business and family groups is a change in the way green cards are counted that would essentially free up some 800,000 additional visas the first year, the AP reported.

The president has been meeting with business and other groups ahead of an expected September announcement of executive actions he will take on immigration reform. Taking steps favored by business groups — traditional Republican allies — is seen as a way of blunting GOP criticism of the executive actions.

"From the White House's perspective, this is an easy way for them to score some points," Matt Mackowiak, a Texas-based Republican strategist, told the AP. "They'll say: 'We're arguing about substance, Republicans are arguing about process.'"

We have long preferred congressional to executive action on immigration reform. But we also have long recognized that sharp disagreements within the Republican caucus make it impossible for the GOP-led House to move beyond paralysis.

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Continuing with a broken immigration system makes no sense. So executive action — which is much more limited in possibilities than congressional action — is the only hope for at least tweaking an archaic and dysfunctional immigration system.

GOP critics of Obama cry that executive actions on immigration and other issues amount to over-reach on the part of the president. It is Congress's responsibility to make laws, not the president's, they say.

That is a nonsensical stance.

The executive branch has wide latitude in determining how to deploy limited resources. Saying the president is violating the Constitution by shaping immigration enforcement is like saying the mayor is breaking the law because police only catch some speeders.

Obama is taking the correct path in examining all options available to him in reforming the immigration system.

That could include deportation relief for the parents of U.S.-born children and youths authorized to remain in the country under a program Obama announced in 2012.

But it also makes sense for Obama to look at ways of fixing the legal immigration system, where Congress also has failed to act.

At some point, Congress will have to act to fix our immigration system. For now, President Obama needs to take executive actions at his disposal.

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